NCC visiting chef will demonstrate Southern cooking

NCC visiting chef presents demo, tasting

Chef Thomas Beckmann will focus on comfort foods of the South during a cooking… (CONTRIBUTED PHOTO )

March 26, 2013|By Diane W. Stoneback, Of The Morning Call

Louisiana's Cajun and Creole cuisine will be at the heart of a public cooking demonstration by Chef Thomas Beckmann, the latest Robert C. Wood Chef-in-Residence at Northampton Community College.

Beckmann will prepare a quartet of famous Southern comfort foods at 6 p.m. April 1 in the Lipkin Theatre, Kopecek Hall on the main campus at 3835 Green Pond Road.

The menu for the evening program will include: Seafood Gumbo, Chicken and Sausage Jambalaya, BBQ Shrimp with White Cheese Grits and White Chocolate Bread Pudding with Praline Sauce. Participants will get to taste the dishes and take home the recipes for $10 a person.

Beckmann brings more than 30 years of experience with Southern cooking to this appearance which also includes working with NCC culinary students to prepare a sold-out dinner at Hampton Winds Restaurant on April 2.

Currently the general manager of Tulane University's dining operations, he oversees 270 employees serving 45,000 meals per week. But he also has served as senior banquet chef and executive sous chef at the New Orleans Marriott and senior sous-chef at the Atlanta Marriott Marquis. An American Culinary Federation Certified Executive Chef, he holds culinary medals from the ACF and the Louisiana Restaurant Association and received Sodexo's 2005 Chef of the Year Humanitarian Award.

Tickets can be purchased online http://webapp.northampton.edu/chef/demo.aspx or at the door.